Manga 110313 Mujirushi

* Spoilers*
I was impressed how Urasawa was able to write a complete story in only 9 chapters, with multiple welll-setup characters and a satisfying character arc. Urasawa has always been a master at having characters feel like real people, with great dialogue, and great designs and expressions. Moreover, his stories always have a great pace, also seen in the artwork that may seem less detailed and pretty than your average manga art, but it serves its purpose and always conveys the right atmosphere.

However, it seems Urasawa bit of a bit more than he could chew, the second half of the last chapters feels like ... an exposition dump basically solving all the mysteries. That part felt very rushed, similarly with the Mujirushi symbol. From the title, cover and first chapter, you would think that the symbol would have some large meaning or maybe connect everything, but it really does not. Especially the last reference to it seems very forced how Michel supposedly has always dreamt of becoming a certain tier of firefighter who wear a badge with the Mujirushi symbol... Billy Bat did the reoccurring symbol a lot better, and I think this manga would have been much better without it.

This could possibly be one of the best manga I have ever read, I worry that I will overhype this, but I just really enjoyed it.

I think that a big part of my enjoyment came from the fact that I purchased this with no prior information as to what the story was about and didn't even open it up to check the inside, so when I actually sat down to read Mujirushi, it shocked me at every turn.

I think that the twist and turns and shocking and unexpected, the story is interesting and the characters are deep and interesting, there really isn't a ... downside to this story.

I never thought I would dislike an Urasawa Naoki manga...

Until today. I decided the checkout the 200 page really short seemingly innocent Mujurushi. Now the main reason I put it so low is because of how short it is, if it was longer no doubt Naoki would have been able to work his story telling genius into making a fantastic ending and long form manga. However given the ridiculous and weird plot I doubt even more volumes would have helped. There's a lot to digest the story was not bad however by his standards it's a 7 at best and this coming from a ... guy who gave Pluto and 20th Century Boys a 10 (masterpieces please read them). Iwami is up there with Jar Jar Binks as characters that can somehow ruin an entire story beginning to end with his horrific character design and dialogue befitting a horror movie where I die of cringe. Other than that stupid French wannabe the rest of the plot and characters are decent I enjoyed the father daughter dynamic and I enjoyed how intelligent the young girl was. The whole factory plot and then the sudden twists that occurred in the later chapters remediates the story and the firefighter guy was by far the standout good guy of the story overall it's not bad but it is disappointing coming from Naoki. I still say check it out. Oh and I've always been a critic of Naoki's art, it's his story telling that transcends the medium of manga and turns every comic he makes into a novel series.




Spoilers section: I can't understand why the father would take her back till I remembered this shit is normal in Japan apparently. I would play devil's advocate and say he did it for his daughter either way throw that hoe wife away. Iyami was really goddamn annoying ruined the entire manga for me with his disgusting character design.